I always tought Adam was living in the Matrix ! A Free Ultima Sprite

I got it and found alot of good new material. Sure some of it was from the previous books, but I expect that. New players may not have access to the previous books and need the info too.

So AH is a thousand monkeys on a thousand data terminals, and ADAM is a prototype expert system.

The question is, are they GOOD systems, or BAD ones (and if the latter, should we assume everything in Shadowrun is them spreading disinformation).

Meanwhile, someone needs to get working on a SQL injection attack to reprogram ADAM to secure our shadowrun materials.

[not sure how to quote a locked thread...] "I estimate that between pre-royalties, labor, and printing costs, that getting Shadowrun started up again with a year of reasonably timed releases would cost roughly half a million dollars. And it would make that back rather easily in that year if distributors could be convinced to hire on. Selling 50,000 books from five or six titles ain't no big thing for a new edition of Shadowrun with the interest generated by a grand reopening. And distributors are interested in this product because it will sell. For money. Right in the middle of the hell storm, PSI added Catalyst to their friends list. If Loren Coleman wasn't in full paranoia mode in his tower of crimson tape, he'd probably be able to shell out that kind of start-up money from his pocket. In cash. Assuming of course that Topps would take him back, which I have difficulty imagining them doing." -The artist formerly known as Permaban

RE: Sentient InDesign CS12 expert program ADAM:
What would you like to see happen with the SR license?

Folks who think Seattle 2072 has a lot of old material should take a good look at Seattle and New Seattle. The latter has entire sections taken from the original book.

I doubt you'll get an answer from Adam on this one!

Maybe I'll be in breach of my NDA, but as a CGL freelancer I can assure you that this is completely true. What isn't clear is whether he just uploaded himself directly to the Posthuman servers under the noses of the CGL spiders, or if he first uploaded pieces of himself directly into our brains via our Dumpshock accounts and is currently running as a distributed system on our collective wetware.

Probably not, but I'm hoping for a witty reply.

Are you expecting any answer other than: I want Shadowrun to have a kick-ass publisher that raises the bar and treats one of the coolest gaming settings ever with the respect it deserves, both in terms of games/books/other wicked stuff and in a business sense. Because if you were, well, I guess I have to disappoint you sometime, and that time is now.

I've been playing SR since the early days of 2nd Edition and Seattle 2072 is the first Seattle book I bought. Why? Being German I've played almost exclusively in the AGS setting.
Yet two reasons made me buy Seattle 2072: First, it looks great and I heard favorable things about it. Second, it wasn't (and won't be) translated to German (instead we got an overhauled and updated Seattle entry in the recent Runner Havens re-release).
I haven't read much of it yet but I like it so far. Of course, someone who knows the earlier books will recognize stuff but not someone who's new to the Seattle setting.


Of course, it can't beat the IMHO ultimate city sourcebook ever released, Cyberpunk 2020's Night City Sourcebook, but then those two books were written following fairly different concepts.

Well met. It was worth a go anyway.

Someone needs to write up a compare/contrast piece on Night City and Seattle Sourcebook as those two seem to be the most heralded (post)cyberpunk setting books.

*strokes chin thoughtfully...*

It is out already? Hrm. I might want to get it since my old FanPro book is degrading rapidly.

Also, it is hardbound, and thus, durable. It stands out between all the Pegasus books, but it is pretty in it's own right.

Yes, every edition needs a Seattle book. We had Runner Havens for 4th edition - yes, it was probably too short, but it's there. Some two(?) years later Catalyst decides to do some minor (and I do mean minor) updates to the world, and we get S2072, where there are a few minor changes and most everything is static from either Runner Havens' update or New Seattle. I was excited, as the write up in Runner Havens wasn't terribly interesting, only to find most everything is the same even within the same edition.

Someone just alerted me to the status of things, so I thought I would drop by, give a brief wave, and say that I wish everyone involved, and the franchise, well. I know how difficult the economics of the RPG publishing world can be without unfortunate complications, deliberate or ignorant, and I hope that CGL can pull through and continue to publish the quality product that they have for their time on the license. And if they cannot, I thank them for their wonderful efforts and hope that whomever picks up the Shadowrun license does well by it and it by them.

I can tell you with absolute certainty that back in 1988 when I was writing the original first edition manuscript on my Apple ][e I would never have predicted that twenty-two years on (OMG!) Shadowrun would continue to have such an active existence. It just simply remarkable, and the only reason it has is because of the talent of those writers and editors and artists who followed on after me and the dedication and persistence of its fan base.

I've been waay out of the Shadowrun loop for some time now, and though Adam Jury - bless him - tried to drag me back in not long ago I just could not make it work with my current schedule and focus. Maybe someday... things are a little less crazy even now... but man there would be a lot of reading to catch up on...

Anyway, good luck to Jason Hardy and everyone at CGL, good luck to the license, and thanks to everyone who's hung in there for all these years. I am confident Shadowrun will see its 25th anniversary (OMG!) in 2014, dragons or no dragons.

Tom Dowd
Shadowrun co-creator

Bad. Definitely, definitely bad.

Thanks very much to Tom Dowd for a kind and gracious post. It's the kind of post where I'm just thrilled he knows my name!

Jason H.

You know...seeing a living legend drop in to post is one of those amazing things. It is if Manowar, Rush, or Meat Loaf
dropped by to say hello. *hmms* Actually...I think it is more awesome then that.

My jaw dropped.......

I mean Tom Dowd the man who co worte Shadowrun 1st edtion and the only listed writer of 2nd edtion just posted it's been what 10+ years?

This is historic.

We're obviously not worthy.

Well... Huh. Cool. Thanks Tom!

I just had a nerdgasm. Thanks Tom.

BlueMax

[Breaks arm patting self on back:]

I may be the one responsible for engaging Mr. Dowdy.
Many thanks to Adam for pointing me in the right direction.

Anyone think when Trollman started this whole thing that we'd get such an honored guest to make a cameo?

Sooooo many memories of the 1st and 2nd editions. THANK YOU for your work. We've been enjoying it all this time ever since!

Khadim.

Jesus was a robot? Huh...didn't see that one coming.

Edit: Tom Dowd is even more awesome than I previously thought. And I really didn't think that was possible to exceed previous levels of coolness, particularly regarding my completely inappropriate love for Night's Pawn and Burning Bright.

Well not all germans like the AGS setting But other than this, I have to agree. I've heard a lot of good things about Seattle 2072 and, owning all three other SR books concerning Seattle, I haven't been disappointed. Sure, there's a lot stuff that's already been in Runner Havens, but I think that was to be expected, the other alternative would be for the whole city to change completely overnight, and I don't really think I'd like this option.

It's my impression that there was a whole lot more from the old Seattle Sourcebook that went right into New Seattle, and still, New Seattle was a decent book in my opinion.

Aye, it should be available...

As I bought it in my FLGS two weeks ago it should most definitely be out, yes

Hrm. I should drop by my flgs tomorrow then.

I have had to spend time with my primary income generator so I'm behind a bit having just read this post on Page 5.1. Anything interesting happen in Thread #4 I should revisit before I consider how to address this?

While I am under no NDA, it isn't clear if I want to wade in at that depth. Anyone who has the graphs I made can PM me to confirm whether or not those are the graphs and, assuming no applicable NDA or legal obligation, can do with them as they wish. Of course, this may already have been done in the following 16 pages of Thread #5, and I explicitly post in ignorance on this point and you have my apologies.

I also have permission to re-post Tiger Eyes' letter she wrote to me, after she became aware that I (alone among the members, it seems) was interested in hearing why David Stansel-Garner, Jennifer, and Adam Jury each resigned. My experience with DSG is that he's upstanding and honest in his dealings, and his resignation (as announced by Randall) was a matter of some curiosity. To hear that the person he had worked closely with in this investigation (Jennifer) had resigned as well made me think the version of events that Randall and Loren were pitching was probably just their side. Later (about 18 hours later, actually), documents released by IMR made it clear that Randall and Loren's version was, at best, a gentle re-telling of the actual events.

The graphs are just visual representations of a long spreadsheet detailing all of the "draws" (still using that term, since that's what it was billed as by IMR) IMR claims were made by Loren L. Coleman. There were 15 positive contributions in there as well, but the net was overwhelmingly negative (in terms of draws vs. "deposits"). I could already picture the draws this way, but to see it made me feel a bit angry and quite disgusted. Understandable, I think, although I remain amazed at how little anger many of the the other members expressed and especially at their continued support of the Colemans and Randall N. Bills.

I'm not angry any more, just disappointed and a little sad.

-Ket

Hell, I'd like to see this letter and these graphs.

My personal take on this is, while Jennifer's given permission to publish the letter, have David and Adam given permission to disclose their reasons for leaving? That would be my personal sticking point to publishing the letter until such time as those two gentlemen give their permission to discuss their reasoning. Just because Jennifer's given her permission to publish the letter doesn't mean that she has permission to disseminate correspondence given in confidence.

But in general, yeah, I'd like to see this stuff, too.

My letter does not reference Adam or David's reasons for leaving, only my own.

@ketjack: Whatever happens to the license, I sincerely hope that you are still affiliated with the Shadowrun franchise.

This is part of what continues to shock and frustrate me about Catalyst. The owners and management seem so entirely detached from the operation of the company, especially when it comes to things like the relationship with freelancers (and apparently the relationship with full-time staff!). Back in 2008, not only were e-mails I sent up the chain ignored by management, but e-mails sent by the line developer on my behalf were simply not responded to. We're not even talking a large company where things could get lost in bureaucracy, which leads me to believe it's mostly a matter of people who should care, simply not caring.

When three full-time staff members resign and when multiple freelancers have reached a point of such frustration that they voice it on public forums, all of the members should be interested, not just ketjak.

Well, that addresses my concerns right there. Thanks for chiming in so quickly.

me too. i am not good with numbers, but pictures i can understand most of the time.

Oops - I just remembered this is a lie. How dare I?!?

I just remembered that, not counting David, one other member (owner) sought out information related to this from at least some of the people who were let go. I will leave it to him to share details, including who he is, but I was not alone, per se.

Also, I will not send the graphs to people who request them via PM (or any other means). Nice try, though.

- Ket

*shrugs* can't blame a paranoid runner for trying ^^

Is this for real?

http://forum.rpg.net/showpost.php?p=120079...p;postcount=199

Or is this life imitating art?

Nobody knows, i did not even get a Link to the Graphs.

I'm waiting for Shadowrun adventure to come out based on all this info. If one doesn't come out, I'm tempted to write one.

If those are real, Frank was pretty close neh?

I'm gonna shake my new SR purchases to see if any money falls out.

And if there really was additional money that's now missing from undeclared income made at conventions and the such, then that's income that did not get declared to the bean counter and thus not to ir IRS and might thus be tax evasion, right?

Bold statements from a bold man. Can anyone verify the validity of these new allegations? Obviously, ketjack can, but he's already stated he won't do so publicly for, I think, obvious reasons.

Let's not speculate. Seriously, we should just write up a Shadowrun adventure on this thingy. Who would the Mr. Johnson be?

This is the wrong thread for not speculating, chummer

Speculations IS IN THE THREAD TITLE!
Also, Mr.Johnson would be Topps i guess. And his Face to the Info Sharks would be Frank Trollman?

(Quick edit to pare down to the core question of my post)

Does the graph include what would have been considered his salary or take as an owner, or is this purely funds above his agreed share?

Clearly, in mid-2008 the chart takes a left turn, but we don't know what's supposed to be normal. He he hadn't taken funds he shouldn't have would he have taken in $200,000? $400,000? Is the $309,000 in cash withdrawals the only missing amount?